The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) of the United States of America has proposed allowing non-licensed devices to operate in the broadcast television spectrum at locations where the spectrum is not in use by television broadcasters. The FCC has proposed the use of a control signal, or beacon, to identify non-licensed users that have the right to transmit within the licensed spectrum. If a beacon is not present on the channel, and no transmissions are taking place, then non-licensed devices are not permitted to operate unless direct access to a central database can be obtained identifying the spectrum as unused. Access to the database may be via wired, wireless, or other robust method. Thus, it is assumed that all parties wishing to transmit within the licensed television spectrum would either check a centralized database, or receive and decode the beacon signal to determine if they can transmit within the licensed television spectrum. Once transmission begins, a beacon signal must be transmitted by the user in order to identify the user.
Because devices wishing to transmit within the licensed television spectrum would need to presumably transmit a beacon signal, and/or access the centralized database, all devices wishing to transmit within the spectrum would need to include added circuitry to do so. This would increase the cost and complexity of any device wishing to utilize the licensed television spectrum. Therefore, a need exists for a method and apparatus for allowing non-licensed communication units to utilize the spectrum, yet not have the added cost of containing circuitry to transmit a beacon signal and/or access the centralized database.